The Town Tattler & The Walther League
Arenzville's Newsletter to Its World War II Servicemen and Women
On July 6, 1943, during World War II, the Junior and Senior Trinity Walther League of the Trinity Lutheran Church of Arenzville, IL, decided to begin publication of a monthly newsletter “dedicated to our boys in the service.” Their stated purpose of the publication was “to keep in touch with our servicemen, and secondarily to keep the home congregation posted on our activities.
In addition, a second town newsletter, the Town Tatter, sprang up in 1945, written by “the Arenzvillians,” a group of persons identified as Charles Elliott, Bob Brasell and Rena (Beard) Kruse. There may have been others.
These two newsletters provide a fascinating window into our village and those times. A new book – The Walther League Newsletters – Arenzville, IL – reproduces all of the known issues of the two newsletters. Together, they provide useful insight into Arenzville’s WW2 local history. Use the link below to purchase your own copy of the book:
A Letter Home – In Every Direction at Once
During World War II, the young people of Trinity Lutheran Church in Arenzville did something quietly remarkable.
They formed a committee. They gathered news from around town – who had married, what the harvest looked like, which families had heard from their sons overseas, what was happening on the streets and in the fields of the community their neighbours had left behind. They wrote it all down. They ran it through a mimeograph machine. And then they mailed it to every man and woman from Arenzville who was serving in the armed forces – wherever in the world they happened to be.
They called it The Walther League News. The community called it The Town Tattler.
It was a newspaper. It was a letter. It was a lifeline.
For a soldier on a Pacific island, a sailor in the North Atlantic, an Army nurse in a field hospital in France – the Tattler was a tangible piece of home. It arrived in a mailbag smelling of whatever the post had been sitting in, and it told you that Arenzville still existed, that the people you loved were still going about their days, and that they had not forgotten you.
And in return, the servicemen and women wrote back. Their letters – from the front, from training camps, from ships at sea – made their way into the newsletter and back into the community’s shared record of the war.
The Final Months of the War
The four issues preserved in this archive were published between April and July 1945 – the final, decisive months of World War II.
The timeline they span is extraordinary:
- April 1945 – Allied forces cross the Rhine into Germany. President Roosevelt dies. The Battle of Okinawa begins. The war in Europe is entering its final weeks.
- May 1945 – V-E Day, May 8 – Germany surrenders. The war in Europe is over. But the war in the Pacific continues, and Arenzville still has men and women in uniform.
- Memorial Day 1945 – The first peacetime Memorial Day in four years approaches – but the Pacific war is still being fought, and the full accounting of the cost has not yet been made.
- 4th of July 1945 – Independence Day. Six weeks before V-J Day. The atomic bombs have not yet been dropped. The war continues.
These four issues capture a community in the exact moment between relief and uncertainty – the war nearly over in one theatre, still ongoing in another, with sons and daughters still somewhere out there.
They are irreplaceable.
“We wrote it in the Town Tattler that the community of Arenzville sent the boys to keep them up on their home-town happenings.” – Edward Wessler, President, Arenzville Community Club, 1947
The Town Tattler – Archive
Four original issues, preserved and available to read. These documents were made available through the generosity of David Beard.
Issue 1 – April 1945
Published April 1945 – as Allied forces push into Germany and the end of the European war draws near.
The first surviving issue. Spring 1945 – the war is turning, but not yet over. Arenzville writes to its servicemen and women in the middle of one of the most consequential months in modern history.
Issue 2 – May 1945
Published May 1945 – V-E Day, May 8. Germany has surrendered. The war in Europe is over. But Arenzville's men and women are still serving.
The May issue arrives into a world transformed. Germany has fallen. But the Pacific war continues, and this newsletter was still travelling to servicemen and women in theatres that had not yet heard the last shot fired.
Issue 3 – Memorial Day 1945
Published Memorial Day, 1945 – the first Memorial Day since V-E Day, but the Pacific war is ongoing.
A Memorial Day issue – and a particularly weighted one. The community pauses to remember those lost, even as the fight continues. This issue bridges the gap between the end of one war and the still-unfinished other.
Issue 4 – 4th of July 1945
Published 4th of July, 1945 – six weeks before V-J Day. The atomic age is weeks away.
The final preserved issue. Independence Day, 1945 – a celebration with a shadow. The war in the Pacific is in its most brutal phase. This is among the last issues sent before the final end of the war changed everything.
Do You Have More Issues?
Only four issues of The Town Tattler survive in this archive. Given that the newsletter was published throughout the war – from at least 1943 onward – it is likely that many more issues once existed.
If you have original issues, photocopies, or any information about The Town Tattler – including the names of people who helped produce it, letters that were published in it, or memories of receiving it – please get in touch.
These documents belong to everyone who ever had family in Arenzville during the war. Help us find them.